Stuffed Shells

My granddaughter Sarah at age 6 loves to help out in the kitchen, so when I am spending time with her I am always looking for recipes she can get involved with. As most kids do, my grandkids adore pasta, so I pulled out an old recipe I made many times in the past for stuffed shells. The filling is a combination of spinach, sausage, and ricotta cheese, and although the kids normally wouldn’t consider eating spinach, they didn’t even seem to notice it in the filling.

Stuffing shells is a great job for little fingers, and all I had to do myself was to make the filling, cook the pasta shells, and make the tomato sauce. Sarah stuffed the shells herself, spooned the sauce on top, and then sprinkled on the cheese. She was so excited to see how they turned out that she asked me to turn on the oven light and pulled up a chair and watched them cook. Of course she thought that they were the most delicious tasting pasta shells ever made once they were finished cooking and served to the rest of the family!

The kids are going through a phase right now where they do not like the texture of chopped tomatoes, so we used pureed ones. If I was making this dish just for adults in the family I would probably use spicy Italian sausage in place of the mild ones, and I would add some chopped fresh basil to the filling mix.

Note: This dish can be prepared ahead of time and refrigerated. Before baking, allow the refrigerated dish to come to room temperature then bake as directed.

Little Fingers Are Perfect For Stuffing Shells

Children Love Helping Out In The Kitchen!

The Shells Are Stuffed So It’s Time To Spoon On The Tomato Sauce

The Dish Is Assembled And Ready To Bake

Close Up Of Completed Dish

Buon Appetito!
Deborah Mele 2011

Stuffed Shells

Yield:Serves 6

Prep Time:25 mins

Cook Time:40 mins

Sausage, ricotta, and spinach are combined to stuff shells which are then baked with tomato sauce and parmesan cheese.